World vol. 10 no. 3047

A MORMON MUTINY.
Mormonism has managed to subsist for nearly fifty years. This fact may well sur-prise those who remember that its founder was a sheep-thief, that its present prophet is a bloated tyrant, that its Bible is a proved imposture, that its pulpit eloquence is a mess of blackguard blasphemy, and that its prac-tice begins by encouraging those appetites which every system deserving to be called a religion has begun by denying, and every successful social polity has found itself forced to restrain.
For the latter half of this period, moreover, it has been steadily growing in numbers and in wealth, so that it has been able to defy the military force of the United States, and that it now survives an unani-mously hostile opinion.
For the latter at least of these achieve-ments, it has doubtless been indebted to the shrewdness with which BRIGHAM YOUNG has managed its temporal affairs. Its inaccessi-bility has been its defence. If the Mormons had remained at Nauvoo, there can be no question but that they would have perished miserably. But although the isolation of Salt Lake protected them against external assaults, it would not have kept them from economical wreck, if there had not been some man of mark at the head of them. This praise of worldly wisdom must certainly be given to YOUNG.
But though his shrewdness has thus far availed to increase and multiply the Mor-mons, and to save them from distress, his tenure of his leadership is very insecure. We have the best and most immediate authority for saying that the effort now making to un-seat him is a most formidable one. Among the leaders of it are men nearly as able as he, who are, moreover, free from the reputation of rapacity which has made him odious. These men see, what he does not seem to see, that, with the completion of the Pacific Rail-road, the solitude which made their security has gone. The desert on an oasis of which the Latter-Day Saints have pitched their tent, and the wilderness which they have made to blossom, if not as the rose, at least as the fragrant leek, will soon be populous with settlers to whom the Book of Mormon is a stumbling-block and polygamy an abomina-tion. The opponents of YOUNG perceive that this population will not tolerate the practice which, to most people, is the chief character-istic of Mormonism, and that it will be necessary for themselves to modify their con-duct, if not their creed, to gain tolerance. As nothing can be done with the herd of Mormons without a pretence of supernatural interposition, these enterprising mutineers have set up an opposition in the business of prophecy which YOUNG has hitherto engrossed. This rivalry of revelations naturally gives rise to a contradiction in the oracles. Not only does the standard afflatus of BRIGHAM, whose monopoly is now impudently infringed, enjoin the practices which the competing afflatus deprecates, but both the inspirers and the inspired abuse each other like pick-pockets. A house thus divided against itself, it is quite evident, cannot stand. And which-ever party gets the better of the desperate conflict which has now been begun, it is clear that a considerable opposition will give to the prestige of the Mormon leader a blow from which it will never fully re-cover. It is above all things necessary to a man in his position to crush every revolt in the egg. When once it has fairly chipped the shell and openly cackled, though he may put it down for the time, it is sure to have successors. The credulous creatures who form the main body of the Mormon faith-ful will have discovered that a tongue which dares to wag against the prophet does not necessarily cleave to the roof of the mutinous mouth. And that discovery is fatal to the supremacy of a man like BRIGHAM YOUNG.
Whatever may be the immediate result of this squabble, we have reason to congratulate ourselves that the doom of the Mormons is sealed. They will be overrun with men of this age if they stay where they are, and another migration, after the long lapse of quiet they have had, would be fatal to them. Mormonism is an anachronism, and as soon as the life of to-day is at liberty, as Mr. MATTHEW ARNOLD might put it, to "play freely" upon it, it is doomed. The Mormons can live in the midst of an American com-munity only by so far conforming to that community as to give up the distinctive doc-trines and the distinctive practices which have made them odious, and which alone have made them Mormons.

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A MORMON MUTINY.
Mormonism has managed to subsist for nearly fifty years. This fact may well sur-prise those who remember that its founder was a sheep-thief, that its present prophet is a bloated tyrant, that its Bible is a proved imposture, that its pulpit eloquence is a mess of blackguard blasphemy, and that its prac-tice begins by encouraging those appetites which every system deserving to be called a religion has begun by denying, and every successful social polity has found itself forced to restrain.
For the latter half of this period, moreover, it has been steadily growing in numbers and in wealth, so that it has been able to defy the military force of the United States, and that it now survives an unani-mously hostile opinion.
For the latter at least of these achieve-ments, it has doubtless been indebted to the shrewdness with which BRIGHAM YOUNG has managed its temporal affairs. Its inaccessi-bility has been its defence. If the Mormons had remained at Nauvoo, there can be no question but that they would have perished miserably. But although the isolation of Salt Lake protected them against external assaults, it would not have kept them from economical wreck, if there had not been some man of mark at the head of them. This praise of worldly wisdom must certainly be given to YOUNG.
But though his shrewdness has thus far availed to increase and multiply the Mor-mons, and to save them from distress, his tenure of his leadership is very insecure. We have the best and most immediate authority for saying that the effort now making to un-seat him is a most formidable one. Among the leaders of it are men nearly as able as he, who are, moreover, free from the reputation of rapacity which has made him odious. These men see, what he does not seem to see, that, with the completion of the Pacific Rail-road, the solitude which made their security has gone. The desert on an oasis of which the Latter-Day Saints have pitched their tent, and the wilderness which they have made to blossom, if not as the rose, at least as the fragrant leek, will soon be populous with settlers to whom the Book of Mormon is a stumbling-block and polygamy an abomina-tion. The opponents of YOUNG perceive that this population will not tolerate the practice which, to most people, is the chief character-istic of Mormonism, and that it will be necessary for themselves to modify their con-duct, if not their creed, to gain tolerance. As nothing can be done with the herd of Mormons without a pretence of supernatural interposition, these enterprising mutineers have set up an opposition in the business of prophecy which YOUNG has hitherto engrossed. This rivalry of revelations naturally gives rise to a contradiction in the oracles. Not only does the standard afflatus of BRIGHAM, whose monopoly is now impudently infringed, enjoin the practices which the competing afflatus deprecates, but both the inspirers and the inspired abuse each other like pick-pockets. A house thus divided against itself, it is quite evident, cannot stand. And which-ever party gets the better of the desperate conflict which has now been begun, it is clear that a considerable opposition will give to the prestige of the Mormon leader a blow from which it will never fully re-cover. It is above all things necessary to a man in his position to crush every revolt in the egg. When once it has fairly chipped the shell and openly cackled, though he may put it down for the time, it is sure to have successors. The credulous creatures who form the main body of the Mormon faith-ful will have discovered that a tongue which dares to wag against the prophet does not necessarily cleave to the roof of the mutinous mouth. And that discovery is fatal to the supremacy of a man like BRIGHAM YOUNG.
Whatever may be the immediate result of this squabble, we have reason to congratulate ourselves that the doom of the Mormons is sealed. They will be overrun with men of this age if they stay where they are, and another migration, after the long lapse of quiet they have had, would be fatal to them. Mormonism is an anachronism, and as soon as the life of to-day is at liberty, as Mr. MATTHEW ARNOLD might put it, to "play freely" upon it, it is doomed. The Mormons can live in the midst of an American com-munity only by so far conforming to that community as to give up the distinctive doc-trines and the distinctive practices which have made them odious, and which alone have made them Mormons.